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Carolina Brewery wins six championship of beer awards

Pittsboro, NC - Carolina Brewery took home six Carolinas Championship of Beer Awards at the Hickory Hops Beer Festival in Hickory, NC on April 12th. Gold awards were presented to Alter Ego Altbier and Flagship IPA, silver awards to Sky Blue Golden Ale, and bronze awards to Copperline Amber Ale and To Hell ‘n’ Bock. The Alter Ego Albier was also awarded Second Place Best of Show for the entire competition.

“Head Brewer Thomas Transue and our brew team are honored to be medal winners in this prestigious event featuring the best beers of the Carolinas," says Carolina Brewery Brewmaster Jon Connolly. "The Carolinas Championship of Beer is an excellent format to showcase the world class efforts of our regional brewers. I am proud to see the craft brewing industry receive recognition for the hard work and dedication required to consistently produce high quality beers."

The Carolinas Championship of Beer Awards competition featured 120 entries spanning 85 different beer styles from over thirty breweries from throughout the Southeast. Entries were tasted blindly by a panel of certified judges. Here are the award winning beers with a brief description of each:

GOLD AWARD & 2ND PLACE BEST OF SHOW: Alter Ego Altbier This beer is the “alter ego” of most German style beers we drink which are pale cold fermented lagers.
Altbier is a rich, fruity warm fermented brown ale. The word “Alt” simply means old and refers to the time before the rise of lager brewing when ales were the dominant brews of Germany. GOLD AWARD: Flagship IPA Originally, this intensely hopped ale was brewed in the 18th century to survive the long sea journey from the cooler breweries in England, around the Cape of Africa to India where the temperatures were too warm to brew. This beer has a unique floral aroma from the generous addition of Cascade hops to the fermenter in a procedure known as dry hopping.

SILVER AWARD: Sky Blue Golden Ale For those desiring a lighter beer that still has hand-crafted integrity, this beer is a Kolsch style ale made famous in its namesake city of Cologne (Koln in German).
This thirst-quenching brew is spritzy, not too malty, with the pleasing aroma of imported Hallertauer hops. While fermented warm like all ales, Kolsch beer undergoes a cold aging period like a lager which results in a brew that is complex yet easy to drink.

BRONZE AWARD: Copperline Amber Ale This brilliant red ale, brewed with caramel and pale malts is a best seller at the Carolina Brewery.
Using traditional brewing methods, the ale yeast provides a touch of fruit and works in tandem with the malt to make for a very drinkable ale. Kent Golding hops lend just enough bitterness and aroma to round out the flavor.

BRONZE AWARD: To Hell ‘n’ Bock Bock beer, though dark in color is actually a lager beer.
The use of a lager yeast and a much cooler fermentation temperature (48 – 50 degrees F) is the main difference between this beer and an ale. This cooler fermentation results in a beer with less fruity flavor than an ale fermented at 65 – 68 degrees F. For that authentic bock profile, To Hell n’ Bock is crafted with lots of Munich malt. This grain has a toasty, bread -like aroma that imparts a delicious malty flavor to complement the fresh German hops.

The awards continue the tradition Carolina Brewery started with a string of 2002 World Beer Championship winners and more recently with their 2006 Great American Beer Festival Gold for Flagship IPA. Carolina Brewery regularly serves a core beer menu along with a rotating selection of seasonal beers that are offered for a limited time only. Carolina Brewery brews all of their award-winning handcrafted beers on-site at their two locations on Franklin Street in Chapel Hill and Belmont Station in Pittsboro.